A blog which charts our journey through the adoption process. The ups and downs, the process and the pondering, the self-exploration and the anticipation.
Hopefully these jottings will be a reassurance, and perhaps be a little enlightening, to others considering this particular journey or making their way through it themselves.

Friday, 31 May 2013

Chapter 5 – Applying... Filling in "The Form"

Into the process – in triplicate!

Having endured the various orientation
and familiarisation sessions, and despite the best efforts of the
social services to put us off, our minds were made up. Adoption it
was. We were “In”. Or at least we were willing to let a bunch of
strangers decide whether we were “in” or “out” or “loitering
around on the front porch” (as some of our friends ended up being).

At the end of the Orientation Day we
picked up a copy of the “Initial information form” and settled
down in front of the computer to fill it in. Now bearing in mind that
I’ve spent a lifetime working in the public sector you’d think
that a bit of form filling would be a piece of cake. However, faced
with the form my first thoughts were less, “Let’s get stuck into
this.” and more”Blimey! Perhaps now’s a good time for some
light relief... like filling in my income tax form...”

The orientation day had warned
applicants that the process would be complex, detailed, invasive and
something we would have to work at. And here was the first
personification of that thought. Or form ended up running for almost
20 pages and I’m guessing that ours was a lot less complicated than
some.

The first question (other than the
standard “name”, “age”, “address”, “shoe size”,
“favourite breakfast cereal” ones) was “It is our policy to
contact previous partners from significant
relationships including marriage, civil partnership and
co-habitation. Please indicate how many contacts will be needed if
this applies and provide contact details.”
Now, for us being practically childhood sweethearts (having hooked up
while at college) this was a fairly straightforward question to
answer. Not so for most of the other couple who proceeded through the
process with us. To say that simple question alone was a cause for
much angst would be an understatement. Let’s face it, relationships
with one’s ex are traditionally a little strained so the thought of
inviting them (potentially ALL of them) to comment on your fitness to
be a parent isn’t a welcome one.

Welcome to the process...!

From then on in, the form became
increasingly like a challenging exam paper. “Why do you want to
adopt?”, “What do you think you have to offer a child?” “What
experience do you have of caring for children?” “What are your
activities and commitments?” “How do you plan to change these to
accommodate an adopted child?”

It’s surprising just how much
pressure there was to produce the “right” answer when, of course,
such certainties were a million miles away from our knowledge and our
experience. Oh well, try to be as honest as possible while ensuring
that the positive message (spin?) was maintained.

Then there were the medical
questions... what should have been a simple list of facts was
particularly painful to go through. How would this be viewed by those
assessing us? Would it be the fact that threw us out of the system or
have little relevance in the end? By this point rationality wasn’t
necessarily taking the lead over sheer paranoia!

Most painful of all was having to trail
through our IVF treatments again. That was a period of time which we
had tried hard to put behind us. To gain some time and distance. But
here were were, listing our unsuccessful IVF cycles, detailing the
miscarriages and fertility treatments which had led us into the IVF
sausage mill in the first place. Question Three Hundred and
Forty Seven: Have you accessed any
counselling or professional support in relation to...?
Too bloomin’ right we had, and God bless our IVF clinic for
providing this as part of the ongoing patient support throughout the
process. Dragging the whole thing back up again was the last thing we
wanted.

But,
of course, there was a good reason for that and for the further
discussions we eventually had with our social worker about it through
our “home study” time. Loss (in all its forms) is a powerful
thing and it can lead to irrational emotions. So much of the
preparation for adoption is as much about the authorities screening
applicants for suitability as ensuring that those applicants have
worked through those emotions and learned to deal with them. As one
travels along the adoption journey, “loss” in its various
psychological definitions and manifestations becomes a recurring
theme. And with good reason... but more about that later.

So,
after around twenty pages of detailed questioning on every
conceivable aspect of our private and public lives our application
form was complete. A week or so after we had attended the orientation
day we submitted the form to our local children’s services for
consideration.

And
then we waited... all through the process of becoming approved as
prospective adopters the single most frustrating thing was the
seeming inefficiency within the system. Of course, the adoption
services are being as pared back to the bone as much as any other
part of the public sector but it always seemed to us that there were
inefficiencies within the system which could have been eliminated
with little or no real additional effort.

For
example, after we first approached our local authority about adoption
and seriously registered our interest there was a wait of four months
before the next Introductory Open Evening came around – the first
compulsory step along the way. After that it was a wait of another
two months before we could attend an Orientation Day. A couple of
weeks after that we submitted our formal application form and started
a wait of another three months for confirmation of a “screening
visit” from a social worker. To top it all, we then missed the next
available set of preparation days because by the time (over two
months later) they sent out medical reports and paperwork they
couldn’t be signed off prior to the preparation day... therefore an
additional, unnecessary three months elapsed between screening visit
and starting the preparation days. And all of this in a virtual
information vacuum.

Frustrating
isn’t the word. However, this type of scenario seems to be common
with all the adopters and prospective adopters we’ve spoken to.
Surely what took almost a year could have been compressed into three,
four or five months?

But once again, I’m jumping ahead.
Our next step was to prepare to open our home and our lives to the
social workers for scrutiny...